For reasons of the heart, I was later obliged to dive into Italy's Caffeinated Complications: ristretto vs. espresso, lungo vs. Americano; black vs. 'stained' with warm/cold milk; served in a glass vs. a cup -- and so on.

After reading about the ristretto method for pulling espresso shots (where a shorter brewing cycle enables the sweetest flavors to be extracted before the bitter ones can develop) in one of my favorite publications, Gastronomica, I was on a mission to find one in LA.